Here is a rather simple fact: inside the procurement system we have – including kludge workarounds like DEPSECDEF Hicks’s “Replicator” – if you believe that the window of greatest vulnerability for war with the People’s Republic of China is 2027 to 2032, which after initial skepticism I have grown to think is correct, then we will go to war with what we have now.
As such, you need to look at what those charged with stewardship of our defense are doing NOW to maximize production of what is a known capability NOW. Not PPT thick, not aspirational, not “sounds sexy.” No. Is ready to go now. Yes, continue to develop and experiment, but that is not the primary effort.
We have consumed the last quarter-century of “time” daydreaming through transformationalism and peacocking our arrogance over previous generations to create “game-changing” offsets in the “out-years.” We have gone through so many “offsets” and “revolutions in military affairs” that I have lost count … none to any meaningful effect.
I am not alone in seeing the present from the perspective of standing on the dung-heap of the promises, spin, hype, and overpromising of the last quarter-century. The breathless hype doesn’t work anymore.
You go to war with the army you have, not the army you want.